The average length of Parliamentary by-election campaign has shrunk by four weeks since the 1970s, sharply narrowing the chance for the public to find out about the candidates presented to them and stifling openness in the candidate selection processes which frequently now have to be run at break-neck pace …

At a time when nominally all parts of the electoral system are deeply concerned with increasing public interest and involvement in our elections, slashing the length of election campaigns runs in completely the opposite direction.

I understand the situation of those who decide to move the writ increasingly quickly, whichever party they are from. They are working fully within the law and, given the law gives them discretion to choose when to move the writ, choosing the date that best suits your own party is understandable. I’ve given advice on this basis myself in the past, particularly for local by-elections.

But there comes a point where everyone should take a step back and ask whether it’s right that the rules are written this way.

Third, people will in future be told if their postal ballot has been rejected. I’ve called for this in the past as informing such failed postal voters would have two important effects. It would help flush out cases of attempted fraud (‘what do you mean my postal vote was rejected? I never applied for one!’) and it would also protect the innocent against losing their vote.

Currently if someone makes a mistake when applying for a postal vote – such as by putting a typo in their date of birth – but then gives their correct date of birth when voting by post, their vote will be rejected as the information does not match. However as they are not told, they do not discover there is a problem and so if their application was for a permanent postal vote, votes at future elections will also carry on being rejected without the voter ever finding out that their votes are not counting.